Happy Mothers Day! I thank God for all you mums and grandmums out there! And I also thank all the women who are like mums to us. Fittingly we are looking at Psalm 8 today so lets thank God now as we come to Psalm 8. This Psalm will show us that God made humans with a very special purpose. And we will come to see that it is in Jesus that we find our true humanity.
Right now, Iâm in the middle of the fortieth birthday season. Many of you may be, too. Many of you remember wedding season: another weekend, another wedding. It is time to dress up all over again.
I know one couple here at church who got married on the Saturday, and the very next week, they were in the bridal party for a friendâs wedding. After wedding season came the âthirtiethsâ season. Been there, done that. Then thereâs the kidsâ birthday parties season. Thatâs still going. Maybe some of you arenât there yet. Or some of you, youâre about to come out of or about to go into school formal season at the end of year 12. Everyoneâs going to one anotherâs formals. Thereâs this school on this date, and another school a few weeks later. Then thereâs the âtwenty-firstsâ season, where each weekend it feels like another birthday and another trip to the shops.
Having been at a few fortieths so far, hereâs what Iâve noticed: thereâs something about turning forty that causes people to take stock on their life. One birthday girl in the lead up to her fortieth shared with Teresa and me, âIs this it? Iâm about to turn 40. What have I done with my life? What have I accomplished? Iâm just a mum. My identity is so caught up in my kids.â In fact, she put it as bluntly as this: âIf I died tomorrow, the only people who would miss me are my kids. There would be no one to take them to school, cook them dinner, and wash their clothes.â
Then there was another fortieth I was at. The speech began like this: âI reckon by the time you turn forty, you want to know the answers to the big questions in life.â
Well, one of the biggest questions in life, the question on everyoneâs lips, is this: âWhatâs my purpose in life? What does it mean to be human?â Well here in Psalm 8, the answer loud and clear is this: whether youâre a beggar or a billionaire, a mum or a managing director, you matter to God, because not only were you made special by God, but in Jesus, you can also be remade by God.
Letâs look at the first and last verses of Psalm 8, verses 1 and 9:
Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory in the heavens. (v. 1, NIV)
Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! (v. 9 NIV)
Do you notice that the first part of the first verse and the last verse of this psalm are the same? This is a psalm that begins and ends with God. This psalm sets and defines humanity not on human terms, but places humanity in relationship to God, and under God. It defines humanity on Godâs terms.
In the phrase, âLORD, our Lordâ, the first âLORDâ, the all-capital-letters âLORDâ, is not David shouting, as it is when we use âall-capsââalthough David does shout praises in this psalm. The capital âLORDâ represents Godâs personal name, âYahwehâ. Davidâs God is âYahwehâ. Godâs special personal name is represented in our English Bibles by âLORDâ being in capitals. And the lower case âLordâ is his job title. Davidâs God is Lord. Heâs the one who rules. âThe LORDâ is who God is (his name), and âthe Lordâ is what God is (his job title).
Now, what is the mood of this words? What is the vibe? I think overall that this is a song of praise, gratitude, and wonder. David couldâve said, âLORD, our Lord, your name is majesticâ, but he didnât. Instead he says âHow majestic is your name.â Godâs name is majestic alright, but itâs also more than that. Itâs as if David canât quite take it in. He canât contain himself! David is trying to get his head around why such a big God even bothers with a tiny species called human who happen to live on one tiny planet in one average-sized solar system, in a relatively unspectacular galaxy.
If by the end of this sermon, we collectively donât have a sense of just how amazing God is, and if we canât join the chorus of verses 1 and 9, and declare âthe LORDâ is also our Lord, and if we canât see how majestic is his name in all the earth, and if praise doesnât fall from our lips in song, in our prayers, in our conversations, and if it doesnât take root deep down in our hearts and in our souls, then weâve failed to fully grasp the wonder of this psalm and Iâve failed as a preacher to convey that to you!
Hereâs an idea for this week. Why not try, in your next prayer, to just spend time praising God. Just let the praise flow from your lips.
In verse 2, look at how God shuts the mouths of his enemies and his avengers.
Through the praise of children and infants you have established a stronghold against your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger. (NIV)
Who are Godâs enemies and avengers? They are not Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America, and the rest of the Marvel superheroes. Instead, for David, âthe enemy and the avengerâ are those who donât want anything to do with God whatsoever!
Notice there how God chooses to take them on. Weâre talking about God who has the entire cosmos at his disposal! Yet his weapon of choice is not to wipe them out with fire, or call down a meteor from another galaxy. Rather, Godâs preferred weapon of choice in verse 2 is what comes out of the mouth of a child. The âguurrrsâ and âgaaahsâ of a child, the most vulnerable, dependent, and weakest members of the human family, stopping the arrogant and powerful dead in their tracks.
In a world of Israel Folau controversies, where Christians have become public enemies and weâre now being silenced, our children might end up being the best evangelists! One of my friendsâ kids would, whenever he met an adultâit could have been the postman, the random stranger at the shops, a visitor or neighbour--without hesitation would ask them: âDo you believe in Jesus?â No shame, no shyness. Wouldnât it be great if we had that too? Wouldnât it be wonderful if âGod-talkâ just naturally flowed from our lips.
Look itâs a side point, but one worth mentioning here. As adults we all have a part to play in helping our young folk praise God. It is not just the mums in the room. Whether itâs discipling kids and youth at church, in Scripture, in the home, at school, in whatever environment, be assured that every prayer thatâll be prayed at kids church today or every song sung by our youth on Friday nights is a declaration that there is a God and how majestic is his name! What an incredible privilege each and every one of us has to shape the soul of another human being, such that they would praise God. Sure it may take a village to raise a child, but it takes a church family to raise a child of God. Why not after church today aim to have a conversation with a kid or youth, and ask them what they learned about God today, or how you can pray for them?
Letâs move on. In verses 3-4, we get a glimpse at just how insignificant we humans are compared to other aspects of the creation we can see. Look with me at verse 3:
When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, [âŠ]
Picture David looking up at the stars which God himself flung into space. We humans do paintings with our fingers, but God paints planets and entire galaxies with his fingers. Last month, humans finally managed to take the first photo of the black hole. This is something that God created simply with a word. The entire history of humanity has had to wait for this up until now. In the words of one astronomer, âWe have seen what we thought was unseeable.â The more science opens up to us new horizons, the more insignificant we seem. Weâre shown to be just a speck of dust.
Verse 4 opens with a question:
What is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? (NIV)
David asks the God who created the black hole, âWhat is mankind?â The answer is in verse 5:
You have made them a little lower than the angels [âŠ] (NIV)
What makes us special is that weâve been made by God. God has made us, and that is what makes us special. Be amazed at how special God made you to be. And not only that, but verse 5 again, you and I have been made âA little lower than the angelsâ. Notice how it doesnât say, âa little higher than an apeâ or âjust a bit more advanced than a chimpanzeeâ. I just love how the Bible has got a higher view of humanity than scientists.
Then, as if it couldnât any better. Along comes the next part of verse 5:
[âŠ] and crowned them with glory and honor. (NIV)
We humans have been âcrowned with glory and honourâ. Weâre royals! You donât have to be born into the royal family like Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor. Itâs not just Archie whoâs royalty: you are too! The God who, back in verse 1, set his glory in the heavens, has crowned us and only us with that glory. What a good and generous God!
There was a study done a few years back, where scientists tried to work out the answer to this question: How much are the elements and chemicals worth that are found in and go to make up the human body. Weâre talking things like carbon, hydrogen, and calcium, etc. Iâm not talking about selling of kidneys on the black market. They are not worth $580,000, or $58,000, or even $580, but believe it or not, your body, based on the current market value, is only $5.80.
Then there is how our world and our culture assigns worth and value to humans. Our culture would say that what makes people significant are things like their status, standing, or the number printed on the waistline of your jeans. Society says youâre dignified based on your looks, athleticism, or intellect. You are despised for your failures, if you canât do certain things, if you look a certain way or if you donât have a job.
Thatâs why itâs so crucial that we tune in to what God says about us, because the God of the Bible says that, regardless of physical ability, mental capacity, skin colour, weâre all image-bearers of the God who made us. That applies to every member of the human family, whether itâs the baby in the womb, the person in jail, or the pensioner with dementia. At the end of the day, our dignity and worth as humans is received not achieved. That means that every human you meet, whether a believer or an unbeliever, is to be treated as a fellow image-bearer. If youâre a Christian here today, know that you reflect the character of God in the way you speak to your work colleague whoâs slacking off, the way you discipline your kids, relate to your parents, include someone whoâs on the outer. Adopt the posture that God has towards all humanity! Thatâs what verse 4 picks up on too.
What is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? (NIV)
Get this: God both thinks of you and cares for you. Now you might be here today as someone whoâs not yet taken the hand of Jesus. We are so glad youâre here. Maybe today is the first time youâve invested some serious time thinking about the things of God. Well know this, that God thought of you before you thought of checking him out. In fact, thatâs true for every single person here! You can be sure that God thinks of you way more than you think of him. In fact, he thought of you before you were even being formed inside your mumâs womb!
And what a relief that is! You might feel alone as you battle with anxiety or depression, but take comfort in the fact that the God who made us knows us better than we know ourselves. He knows you inside out, and stands with you in the fog. You might be hurting from a mum you wish youâd have, or grieving a mum youâve said goodbye to, or wishing you were a mum. God knows and draws near to you in that pain and grief too.
Davidâs not done. Thereâs one more thing that makes humans special, verse 6:
You made them rulers over the works of your hands; you put everything under their feet (NIV)
Pretend we double-clicked on the word âeverythingâ. Out would pop verses 7 and 8, where David says, âEverythingâ means all the flocks, herds, all the animals, be they birds, or fish or land creatures. Humans were created to be over creation but under God. Itâs as if God gives us the keys not to the car but to creation and says, âYou look after it.â This job is just for humans. Thatâs why we ride horses, horses donât ride us. Thatâs why humans have managed to build some impressive architecture, discovered things like black holes, and come up with cures and medical advancements.
But notice here also that thereâs not even a hint of reincarnation. Us and the animals are very distinct categories. We donât come back in another life as an animal, a dog or a cockroach. No, we rule over the animals. Weâre the pinnacle of Godâs creation. This is the dignity of the human race!
Compared to the bigness of God, we are mere dust, but because weâre unlike anything else in all creation, weâre glorious dust!
Now I want you to think about this question: to what extent could you say that Psalm 8 is a reality, as you look around at our world today. To what extent do we see that humans are ârulers over the works of [Godâs] handsâ and that God has âput everything under their feetâ? And we must say that as we exist now, the rule we experience is partial and incomplete. We fall short in our rule of the earth. We are glorious dust, or in the words of Francis Schaeffer, we are a âglorious ruinâ. We donât rule the world, and creation does not submit to our rule all the time. Sometimes creation controls us: a tsunami here, an earthquake there. Sure, we humans can tame lions, but I canât even tame my tongue. And rather than ruling the world together, we fight one another for the right to rule.
The best illustration of how Psalm 8 is only partially true is the fact that humans pick up dog poo! Now Iâm a dog guy. I love dogs. But you think about it: whenever you see someone taking their dog out for a walk, they stand by and wait for the dog to do itâs business, and then they crouch down, scoop it up with a plastic bag, and carry it to the next bin. That doesnât sound like humans calling the shots in the way that Psalm 8 envisages! So you dog-owners out there, the next time you pick up dog pooâand trust me, Iâm thankful that you do do itâlet that remind you of Psalm 8.
But our problem is more than just having to pick up dog poo. We fail to rule Godâs world properly and perfectly. We have broken, messed up relationships, full of regrets. Sure, we can try and exercise control, but more often than not it feels as though weâre out of control. We canât even rule over death. Death rules over each and every single one of us! Weâre made from dust. Weâll also return to dust. Things arenât what theyâre meant to be! We are broken! We need fixing!
Now the author of Hebrews pick up on this disconnect and frustration, and a thousand years after David penned this Psalm, the author of Hebrews wrote, in Hebrews 2:8 concening Psalm 8, âYet at present we do not see everything subject to them.â Humans donât yet fully rule the earth, but in Hebrews 2:9, Hebrews says, âBut we see Jesus, who was made lower than the angels for a little while, now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death.â
Jesus, being the perfect human, is crowned with the glory and honour that Psalm 8 tells us about. He was the truest human, being sinless. He was God in the flesh, being born as a weak infant and placed in an animal feeding trough in a little-known town called Bethlehem. He grew from a vulnerable child to manhood, going around doing good and healing people because God was with him, only to be unjustly condemned and executed, and then rise again. He is the one under whose feet God places all things. Everything and everyone is subject to him! Jesus is now crowned? And he was crowned, according to Hebrews 2:9, âbecause he suffered deathâ. Remember that Jesus wore a crown of thorns on his head as he hung there on that cross. For Jesus, the pathway to glory was suffering: death first, then glory and honour after.
You think about it: the very thing that puts a one giant full stop on all human lifeâdeathâis the exact the same thing God uses to install Jesus as the true, perfect, ruling human, the very human that Psalm 8 is talking about. And notice about Jesusâ death, that it wasnât a death just for him. Take a look at how verse 9 finishes: âJesus tastes death for everyoneâ. Jesus tastes death not just for some people, or for those who are good enough, but for every single one of us.
Hebrews 2 can be summarized as âbe amazed at how special God remade you to be.â Not only are we made special in our motherâs womb, but now thanks to Jesus, we can be re-made by him. Whereas at birth you were made a little lower than the angels, now in your second birth you will be made higher than the angels, for you will be with Jesus around his throne forever. That happens the moment we take the hand of Jesus.
Now Iâve got these babushka dolls. They are a doll within a doll within a doll. These are actually measuring cups. I grabbed them out of my kitchen. But I reckon they help us understand what it means to be remade by Jesus. I know that this is not the perfect illustration, but I found it helpful. Maybe you will too. This smallest cup or babushka doll is you and I, made by God. And this is Jesus, a larger cup or babushka doll. Now your life, my life, and all human life are precious to God, because every human is made special by God. But what gives us even more significance is when we actually surrender and take the hand of Jesus, so as to side with him. Another part of the Bible, Colossians 3, describes this process as having our lives hidden with Christ, just as one of these babushka dolls fits in the larger one. When our lives are hidden in Christ, weâre letting God transform us from the inside out. Weâre letting him call the shots so that what happens to him, happens to me. Where he is, I am. Where heâll be, Iâll be. Thatâs what it means to be remeade: that what happens to him, happens to me. Itâs a day by day, moment by moment journey.
Thereâs a clear decision to be made here. I want to invite you to be remade by Jesus. Do you realise that to say no to Jesus and his offer of being remade is to accept that $5.80 is as good it gets. Thatâs all youâre worth. But even if we were worth $580,000, that still wouldnât compare to being remade by Jesus, the worth that he gives you, and the identity you receive in him.
Letâs wrap up. Iâm so thankful for the three mums I have in my life. First is my own mum, whose a real do-er and canât sit still, so that the way she loves me is by acts of service. Last Sunday when she visited, she ironed this shirt! It had only just came in off the clothesline the day before! Second is mum number 2, my mother-in-law. The thing that Iâve come to appreciate about my mother-in-law is that sheâs a woman of prayer. Prayer is part of her DNA in a way I wish it was in mine. It is her constantly coming before her heavenly Father that has sustained her through some horrible times. She has had to bury her husband, her own son, and last year, a granddaughter. Third thereâs my wife Teresa, mum of four, a stay-at-home mum, she shows again and again that there is glory in the ordinary, whether itâs comforting a kid whoâs just had tough day at school, searching for the other kidâs missing tracky dacks, consoling a kid who doesnât want to go to school, or cheering another one whoâs running cross country. She models Jesus to our kids in so many ways! I said to one of my kids this weekâwho shall remain nameless because this was after they had just chucked a tantrumââYou know what? Thereâs only one person in the entire world you get to call âmumâ. And not only that, but God knew that sheâd be the perfect mum just for you.
And so as thankful as I am for each of these mums, Iâm even more thankful for the God who gave them to me.
Mark Twain said that the two most important days of your life is the day you're born and the day you know why. You donât have to wait until you turn forty or fifty or seventy to work out the answers to the big questions in life. Youâve got the answer today! Whatâd you learn at church today? Be in awe of the one who made you. Be in astonishment of the one whoâs remade you.
Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name!
Letâs pray!
Lord, our Lord,
How amazing it is that you have not only created each and every one of us, but that youâve also given us purpose, meaning, dignity, worth, and value. We particularly want to thank you for the special role mums have in our world. But even more than this, we want to praise you for giving us Jesus, the true and perfect human, the one who died the death we deserve, and now offers us the chance to be remade by him from the inside out.
All glory and honour be to you.
Lord our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth.
And all Godâs people said Amen.